Cooperative federalism is doomed

When it comes to fixing the broken politics of global warming, all eyes tend to focus on the global stage and on national policies. After all, climate change is a global phenomenon and emissions in one part of the world contribute to warming everywhere. But in the United States, sub-national governments are responsible for most of the progress in the climate change arena, despite the lack of an obvious rationale for them to reduce emissions whose benefits will spread well beyond their borders. Thirty-five states have stepped in to fill the void left by federal inaction, adopting plans to curb emissions even though the benefits of those reductions will be shared widely.

These state-level actions are important for a variety of reasons. First, they bring real and meaningful reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Perhaps more significantly, they have several key implications for national climate policymaking. These actions point to a rationale for national action and to policy solutions that can attract political support. Further, in the United States, state lawmakers and administrators implement and enforce national air pollution control programs. Thus, state-federal cooperation is crucial for successful program implementation. Finally, the Clean Air Act amendments have passed only when lawmakers accommodated state and regional economic and political considerations.

Understanding why states have or have not acted and illuminating their policy approaches can inform the federal policymaking process. The very fact of state leadership in the climate change arena also means that the customary mode of cooperative federalism will not work. In air pollution control, the "customary" mode is a center-dominant model in which the national government establishes an overall framework that the states implement. Climate change policymaking demands a new, "upside-down" cooperative federalism model.